Sitting on George Washington's Porch

Tuesday, our last day in the Washington DC area - up early and off we headed to see more things before our flight at 5:30 pm.  We headed from Maryland to the home of George and Martha Washington, Mt. Vernon.  Fun story... my wonderful younger sister Denise was the navigator for our tour leader, her husband Steve.  He wanted to use the GPS, Denise was more comfortable using her iPhone.. we sat in the back seat and giggled as they "discussed" how to get to Mt. Vernon.  But we made it there!  :-) When you arrive, you first see a restaurant and gift shop, then you walk further and there is a large visitor center where we watched a movie to tell us about George's military career, how me met Martha and of their life at Mt. Vernon.  Then we walked out of there and walked up uphill and wound our way to this beautiful home.  There were pastures with animals in them.  You get your first glimpse of the mansion across a great expanse of lawn called a bowling green. 

 I snapped this photo of a pretty flowering bush with the house in the distance.

Near the entrance to the house is this large vegetable garden on the left with the Slave Quarters behind it, of course there was scaffolding..  :-)  Here is a map of the ESTATE.

Nearing the entrance of the mansion I saw this glorious magnolia in blossom.   

Getting closer to actually entering the mansion that George Washington lived in!  Now, I must regretfully inform you that photography is not allowed inside - as it was also not allowed in the White House - and I was told it is for security reasons.  That just killed me not being able to show you the inside.. wah.

We passed through a wonderful dining room with such wonderful antique things on the table and walls.. the door was open looking out on the front porch and I was able to snap this neat photo of the chairs on the porch and the view of the Potomac River. 

Another snap as we walked across the porch to the next door inside. 

This is the view that was enjoyed by George and Martha.. and now I was seeing it too, and now you are! :-) 

 After the tour of the inside of the house, up and downstairs, you are ushered outside and are invited to sit and rest on the porch, just the neatest thing ever.. hubby walked down the grass and took a shot of this side of the house and my sisters and BILs and I sitting in the chairs resting and enjoying the view.  

This tree on the sloping front yard is an old one believed to be there from when George and Martha lived here, but I cannot find out the type of tree it is, Google failed me on this one.  

When we made our way back to the visitor center I looked more closely at this dollhouse sized reproduction of the Mt. Vernon mansion. I snapped some photos so you could see what is inside, kind of.  Click HERE for a virtual house tour.

The bedroom at the top left is George and Martha's room and where he died of a throat infection.  I must tell you that it was something to stand at the door of that room and realize that it's where the "Father of our Country" lived and died.   

This is a miniature reproduction of the dining room where our tour began. 

The parlour.

This is the Lafayette bedroom. 

This below shows more of the dining room and the beautiful window and paint details.  Just gorgeous. 

And so we left Mt. Vernon - it was my favorite place, second only to our visit to the White House.  We then headed to Virginia to the National Air & Space Museum, the Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles Airport.  More giggling at the navigator and driver.  :-)

It was lunch time when we got there, I was hoping for a nice comfortable dining room there, but guess who has the food concession there?  McDONALDS!  So, we stood in line for  almost a half an hour along with 100 other people to order lunch.  As we were snarfing down fries I said.. you know, I only got one airline confirmation on my phone, and it was for you, honey.  He goes.. what???  So, poor hubby takes his iPhone off to find a quiet corner in that monster building to call the airlines and check on my flight.  Poor man, after nearly an hour on the phone talking to people twice as he had to find me and get my credit card to give them.. he found that when booking, I'd clicked on "July" instead of "June" and had no ticket for our flight in just a few hours.  :-(  After wrangling with them he finally got them to move the ticket to that day and there was even an empty seat next to him.. ::whew::  Only 2 of our party looked around the museum, 1 was on the phone and the 3 of us girls did some shopping in the museum store.  I got 4 airplanes for our 4 grandsons.  But here are some shots Dayle got on his iPhone.  :-) 

This is the SR 71 Blackbird airplane.  In the room behind it was the Space Shuttle.

I will not go into detail about the abject misery that is going through security at Washington DC's Dulles Airport.  We were in lines that snaked around forever and it took an age to get through it.  But we got on the plane, even me.. and tried to make the best of the non-stop 5 hour flight.  See the pretty clouds?  :-)  Thank heavens for a magazine and my iPad and iPhone.. I only have one movie on the iPad, so I watched "Tinkerbelle".  Yes, that's how desperate I was.  For dinner on the plane we had Oreos and snack mix.  :-) 

And so.. our wonderful son Shawn picked us up at the airport and brought us home.  What a trip.. glad to be home, though.  There's no place like home.. 

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed learning and seeing such a historic part of the United States of America.  ((hugs)), Teresa :-)